Gary is an author, trial lawyer, Mequon-area resident and town of Cedarburg supervisor. He is a columnist for the News Graphic and writes for several Wisconsin area magazines and is a national columnist with The American Thinker and PJ Media. He lives with his wife, Lisa, and has three sons ages 18 to 28. Gary won Ozaukee County in his bid for the Wisconsin Assembly's 60th District in 2011, but came up just 58 votes short.

"Communism has never come to power in a country that was not disrupted by war or corruption or both."– John F. Kennedy

When I was a young boy my parents were both Democrats by birth. They rallied behind the pro-capitalism speeches of John F. Kennedy and nodded in agreement when told not to expect their country to do things for them. They were moved by Kennedy's heartfelt belief in American exceptionalism, self-reliance, and the innate goodness of our country. They cried when he died.

Today, my parents are staunch conservatives and defenders of the American ideal. They didn't leave the Democratic Party – it left them. It is no longer the party of Hubert Humphrey and John F. Kennedy, the original Reagan Democrat. It wasn't hijacked, but rather, was slowly consumed by a growing political base of radical Communists and Marxists. After all, where else were they going to go?

When the Soviet Union collapsed because of the bankrupt philosophy and untenable idealism of communism, radical socialists and communists became Social Democrats and flocked to the American Democratic Party, where they have been nesting ever since. Decades of slowly warming up the pot of water in which the proverbial frog is sitting has resulted in the death of the frog. Communism is no longer the four-letter word it once was. We don't even call Red China "Red" anymore. Even John F. Kennedy was a militant anti-Communist. In many ways, when JFK died on November 22, 1963, the United States died with him. His death ushered in a new era of growing Communism masquerading as "Progressivism" and headquartered squarely within the Democratic Party.

Today's Democratic Party is unrecognizable to my parents. House Democrats in 1970 voted with their party's majority only 58 percent of the time, that figure is now 91%. And it is precisely the same among Senate Democrats. Even more to the point, even the least liberal Democrats vote with their party approximately 75 percent of the time.

Some years ago I remember the shock and surprise of many Democrats when they learned that the Communist Party was supporting Democrat candidates instead of running their own. Earlier this month Joe Sims, co-editor of the Communist Party USA online magazine Peoples World states among other things "the possibility that the communists may be able to "capture' the Democratic Party entirely." Sims admitted something that most conservatives already knew - U.S. Communists are using the Democrat Party to accomplish their goals.

Imaginary class struggle has fueled the growth of Communism within the Democrat Party. For over a generation, the Democrats have flaunted an anti-corporate economic message ("They are raking in profits while you are struggling to pay the bills!") along with full-throated support for business regulations, expansive government protections for the working class, and an ever-expanding base of constituents addicted to ever-expanding entitlements, all paid for by a shrinking middle class.

If you think this is just more outlandish conservative diatribe, I challenge you to name one significant issue on which the Democrat and Communist Parties disagree.

We have only ourselves to blame for this tolerant journey leftward. Russia’s Pravda said it best recently, “The American descent into Marxism is happening with breath-taking speed, against the backdrop of a passive, hapless people.” Like sheep, many of us are being led toward the collectivist notion that the group is superior to the individual and thus individual rights and freedom may be destroyed with impunity for the perceived "common good.”

There is a lot of talk from Democratic leaders about "working middle-class families," but did you know that the original communist struggles were struggles against the middle class? Communism rallied the proletariat – the lowest of socio-economic classes (wage laborers) in a society - against the bourgeoisie, which until the 19th Century were really the middle class, small business owners and those who employed and "exploited" the working class. But in America – the country designed to make it possible for even the lowest on the socio-economic ladder to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps – there really are no classes or class struggles, which is why it has taken Communism and Socialism such a long time to gain a significant foothold, and why most of the rhetoric you hear form the left is couched in terms of "tax cuts for the rich", "haves vs. have-nots", and similar divisive vernacular. Demonized are the CEOs of U.S. banks, Wall Street executives, tobacco companies, and oil companies. Democratic political-speak makes it seem like we are locked in a class war of monumental proportions.

The logic goes something like this. It is tantamount to religious doctrine among many liberal Democrats that a substantial percentage of people who vote for Republicans are willfully voting against their own class interests. The Republican Party has traditionally been the party of capital, they reason, while the Democratic Party has long identified itself with the interests of workers. Most people are workers. Therefore, a majority of voters should be Democrats. The only flaw with this logic is that most of the communist/socialist agenda masquerading as "progressivism" is harmful to the American economy, small business owners, and the so-called proletariat they employ. In short, it hurts everybody.

A single-year snapshot of Census data can show almost 40 percent of the U.S. population making less than $40,000. On paper, that amounts to widespread economic distress. It suggests that something close to a majority of Americans may have a very direct personal stake in supporting social safety net programs for the poor - the programs that "Progressives" are most commonly identified with in public opinion surveys -- because they themselves might need government assistance at some point in their lives.

In America, however, people are not locked into some feudal class, barred from land ownership and subjugation to the despised and reviled bourgeoisie. But because people's incomes fluctuate from year to year, the more accurate way to measure socio-economic well--being is to look at average earnings over a longer period, for instance, 15 years. Analyzed that way, the data show that only about 23% of adults in their prime working years have average family incomes of $40,000 or less. Most families experience several years in which their incomes are 25% below or 25% above their extended averages.

The Communist Party is naturally jealous of today's Democratic Party, having accomplished government ownership of the auto and financial industries, redistribution of wealth, and free rationed healthcare. These have all been among Communists' chief political goals. Today's Democratic Party platform resembles, almost-line-for-line, the Communist Party platform of 1963.

In 1963, Representative A.S. Herlong, Jr. of Florida read into the Congressional Record excerpts of the 1958 book, The Naked Communist, written by W. Cleon Skousen, an American conservative political commentator advocating a faith-based Constitutionalist ideology, and alerting the American people to the seductive dangers of communism in America. The following were identified in the book as state goals of the Communist Party:

1. U.S. acceptance of coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.

2. U.S. willingness to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.

3. Develop the illusion that total disarmament [by] the United States would be a demonstration of moral strength.

4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war.

5. Extension of long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.

6. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination.

7. Grant recognition of Red China. Admission of Red China to the U.N.

8. Set up East and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev's promise in 1955 to settle the German question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.

9. Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the United States has agreed to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.

10. Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.

11. Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand that it be set up as a one-world government with its own independent armed forces. (Some Communist leaders believe the world can be taken over as easily by the U.N. as by Moscow. Sometimes these two centers compete with each other as they are now doing in the Congo.)

12. Resist any attempt to outlaw the Communist Party.

13. Do away with all loyalty oaths.

14. Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. Patent Office.

15. Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.

16. Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions by claiming their activities violate civil rights.

17. Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers' associations. Put the party line in textbooks.

18. Gain control of all student newspapers.

19. Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations which are under Communist attack.

20. Infiltrate the press. Get control of book-review assignments, editorial writing, policy-making positions.

21. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV, and motion pictures.

22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to "eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms."

27. Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with "social" religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity, which does not need a "religious crutch."

28. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of "separation of church and state."

29. Discredit the American Constitution by calling it inadequate, old-fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a worldwide basis.

30. Discredit the American Founding Fathers. Present them as selfish and racist aristocrats who had no concern for the "common man."

31. Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was only a minor part of the "big picture." Give more emphasis to Russian history since the Communists took over.

32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture--education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.

33. Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the Communist apparatus.

34. Eliminate the House Committee on Un-American Activities.

35. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.

36. Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.

37. Infiltrate and gain control of big business.

38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand [or treat].

39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.

40. Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.

41. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents. Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents.

42. Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of the American tradition; that students and special-interest groups should rise up and use "united force" to solve economic, political or social problems.

43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.

44. Internationalize the Panama Canal.

All one has to do today is read the New York Times or watch CNN to discover that President Obama's Administration and the Democrat Party have followed the Communist tick list to the letter. Most of these objectives have either been accomplished or are in the process of being accomplished. Just recently Republicans faced genuine controversy over the suggestion that they dare to read the U.S. Constitution on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Our government is supposed to be very simple and straight forward. A House of Representatives; a Senate insulated from the voters representing State governments; an independent Judiciary and an elected Executive, all limited in scope and power by a fixed Constitution. The purposes of government are supposed to be very simple, and very limited. National defense, border security, a postal service, international relations, and that’s about it. The whole design of the American government is intended to protect the natural rights of citizens to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness – in other words, encourage a free and open market: Capitalism.

The Communist Manifesto – and, it would seem, the Democratic Party – appears to be the polar opposite and seeks the destruction of, all of the uniquely American principles contained in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States. Moments after President Obama had finished his vapid January 28, 2010 State of the Union, the Communist Party USA website praised the president's activist government, reform agenda, and pandering to "working people." The same website touted Obama's victory in 2008 as a victory for unions, working people, labor, and workers' rights to organize. It spoke of his Inauguration as "President Barack Obama's People's Inaugural."

I have often been amazed at how many younger people do not know who Karl Marx was or what Marxism is. I have often been astounded at how many Americans, of all ages, see “Liberal” or "Progressive" political views and programs as merely an idealistic approach to harmless-sounding goals such as "social justice" or "equality" under the law, as opposed to being Marxist, anti-American, and aimed at the eventual destruction of America. Indoctrination via public education has done its evil work to the point where I can no longer tell the difference between the compassion of Democratic liberalism and the inherent evils of Communism.

The mantle of American freedom has fallen to us. The responsibility of protecting liberty and defeating tyrrany is ours and ours alone. Thomas Paine once wrote that "Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it." Andrew Jackson warned us in his Farewell Address that "eternal vigilence is the price of liberty." And it was Edmund Burke who presciently reminded us that "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." It's time to do something.

This site uses Facebook comments to make it easier for you to contribute. If you see a comment you would like to flag for spam or abuse, click the "x" in the upper right of it. By posting, you agree to our Terms of Use.